Student offering to set up CSAs on the Open Food Network

[Nick Weir]

Later this year the Open Food Network (OFN) will enable repeat order and subscriptions.  We think this will make OFN useful for CSAs wanting an online ‘shopfront’ to manage CSA shares with the option for CSA members to supplement their shares with additional items.

 

OFN has been approached by a Belgian student, Theodore who wants to work with a UK CSA for a couple of weeks (or possibly longer) starting on 12^th February.  He wants to set up the CSA with an OFN shopfront and work with the CSA team to make OFN as useful as possible in terms of immediate use (selling produce on an ad hoc basis – maybe to supplement an off-line CSA share system)and future use (when CSAs will be able to use OFN to manage their shares as well as ad hoc sales).

 

Theodore is not charging for his time and will have online and phone support from the OFN team.  However he will need accommodation during his stay.

 

Please let me know if you are interested in hosting him.

 

Thanks

Nick

 

Nick Weir

Open Food Network UK

01453 840037

www.openfoodnetwork.org.uk

Supporting producers and communities to organise for Food Sovereignty

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[Banc Organics]

Dear Nick

We hope you are well. 

Thanks for the message. Being non-technical, we don't really understand what is being offered here, but we are actively looking at the moment for options about how to develop better software for our CSA - we currently use Buckybox which is not really up to scratch, and were thinking of trying to get money to adapt that software (which is open source). Is this OFN system going to be a possible alternative option for small CSA's like ours do you think? And is it going to be available to lots of CSA's, or only the one that puts up the student? Re that, we might be able to put someone up & could look into it. 

Many thanks

Sian and Sue, Banc Organics 

~ the team at Banc Organics

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[Riverside MarketGarden]

Hi guys, 

Can you copy me into the conversation as we are in the same situation at Riverside Market Garden, 

thanks - hope all's good with you Martin,

kind regards

Debbie Leigh

Admin Support

Call 07889 846526

Office hours vary, but usually Tues/Weds/Thurs

Changes to your veg order need to be made by Sunday 3pm

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On 23 January 2018 at 13:07, Banc Organics <bancor...@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear Nick

We hope you are well. 

Thanks for the message. Being non-technical, we don't really understand what is being offered here, but we are actively looking at the moment for options about how to develop better software for our CSA - we currently use Buckybox which is not really up to scratch, and were thinking of trying to get money to adapt that software (which is open source). Is this OFN system going to be a possible alternative option for small CSA's like ours do you think? And is it going to be available to lots of CSA's, or only the one that puts up the student? Re that, we might be able to put someone up & could look into it. 

Many thanks

Sian and Sue, Banc Organics 

~ the team at Banc Organics

On 21 January 2018 at 11:41, Nick Weir <ni...@nickweir.co.uk> wrote:

Later this year the Open Food Network (OFN) will enable repeat order and subscriptions.  We think this will make OFN useful for CSAs wanting an online ‘shopfront’ to manage CSA shares with the option for CSA members to supplement their shares with additional items.

 

OFN has been approached by a Belgian student, Theodore who wants to work with a UK CSA for a couple of weeks (or possibly longer) starting on 12^th February.  He wants to set up the CSA with an OFN shopfront and work with the CSA team to make OFN as useful as possible in terms of immediate use (selling produce on an ad hoc basis – maybe to supplement an off-line CSA share system)and future use (when CSAs will be able to use OFN to manage their shares as well as ad hoc sales).

 

Theodore is not charging for his time and will have online and phone support from the OFN team.  However he will need accommodation during his stay.

 

Please let me know if you are interested in hosting him.

 

Thanks

Nick

 

Nick Weir

Open Food Network UK

01453 840037

www.openfoodnetwork.org.uk

Supporting producers and communities to organise for Food Sovereignty

Sign up here for monthly updates on the Open Food Network

 

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[tom okane]

Sounds interesting. We are currently partnering with Swansea Food Assembly so our members can order local produce through their site & then collect it at the same time as they get their veg share. Food assembly will drop any orders to us. This is the plan to be developed in next couple of months. So probably no need currently for OFN. Thanks, Tom

Tom O'Kane Cae Tân csa / 07791696848 / www.caetancsa.org 

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[Nick Weir]

Dear Sian, Sue, Debbie and anyone else interested in this

 

Yes OFN is an alternative to Bucky Box and we are talking to them about collaborating on development.  I would be happy to do a screen share session to show you how OFN works and see if OFN might be able to cover some of the gaps you have found in Buckybox.

 

I do need to repeat that the OFN ‘subscription’ functionality (which will allow CSA members to get the same share every week without logging on) is still in testing and will not be ready for Theodore’s visit on 12^th Feb.

 

However OFN is available to all CSAs.  It is just that Theodore is offering to do the set up and work so that you can test the online service.  Once the subscription service is released all CSAs will be able to set up on OFN (but without Theodore’s help!).  There is an online OFN support system here.

 

Setting up OFN is a quick process.  I expect that Theodore could probably do several CSA’s during his visit.

 

Thanks all for your interest

Nick

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[tom okane]

Hello Nick and all, having investigated food assembly in more detail, we would like to explore the OFN option as we think this would suit us better.

I'm ccing Jack who runs Swansea food assembly as he is keen to develop OFN with us.

Cheers, Tom

Sent from my iPhone

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[Nick Weir]

Hello Tom and all

 

Would you like me to organise a screen share session with anyone interested in exploring how the Open Food Network could work for them?  If so please click on the doodle link below and I will set up a hangout.

 

Please click here to doodle for a screen share date

 

Thanks

Nick

[Riverside MarketGarden]

Hi Nick n' all, 

I'll take a look at the Doodle dates- but quick question before. We get on pretty well with Bucky Box for managing our orders  - its limitations for us are at the front end, taking new business from people we haven't communicated with before, and then on the payment side - generating a payment request to the customer, and matching it to their vegbag account (we use Go Cardless for taking payment).

Would OFN have anything better to offer in those areas?

Tom - FYI, we went quite a long way down the road with a food assembly setting up near us - but the commissions just didn't make it worthwhile in the end. Nice model though.

cheers

Debbie

kind regards

Debbie Leigh

Admin Support

Call 07889 846526

Office hours vary, but usually Tues/Weds/Thurs

Changes to your veg order need to be made by Sunday 3pm

Buy our veg here

Sign up to our newsletter

Visit our website www.riversidemarketgarden.co.uk

Find us on Facebook Riverside Market Garden

Follow us on Twitter @rmarketgarden

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[Nick Weir]

Hi Debbie and all

 

To answer your questions:

1)      OFN has a ‘shopfront’ (like this) which you can either make private (members only) or public.  You can then set up ‘products’ on the shopfront which could be a regular veg share and/or individual items

 

2)      On the payment side the customers/members need to choose from one of the ‘payment methods’ that you set up.  This could be;

a.       Stripe which is a lot cheaper than PayPal and we think is much easier to manage

b.      PayPal

c.       Bank transfer

d.      Cash or cheque on collection/delivery

e.      Invoicing though OFN or via accounting systems like Quick Books Online

f.        Or any combination of the above

 

3)      In terms of commission, OFN does it differently.  After a 6-month free trial you are asked to contribute a minimum of £1 per month to OFN running costs.  We are a platform co-op and ask shopfront users to contribute according to a) the value they feel they are getting from the service and b) their ability to pay.

 

More about OFN below

 

Cheers

Nick

Open Food Network  (OFN)  is a not-for-profit cooperative of food and drink producers, processors, distributors and sellers using a common online platform to build a fairer and more sustainable food distribution system.  Here are some links:

o   OFN values

o   Summary of OFN services

o   The OFN feature list

o   A brief video about how OFN works

o   Some background on OFN

o   The economic and environmental benefits of OFN

o   How OFN is being rolled out in the UK including details of our not-for-profit nature and how we cover the costs of OFN services as a platform cooperative

o   The OFN UK map showing producers and hubs who are set up already

o   If you want to set yourself up on the Network (and get on the map!) here is the link to register.  There is no cost to registering as a producer on OFN

o   Sign up here for monthly updates on the Open Food Network

o   Here is a recording of a recent OFN webinar hosted by the Sustainable Food Cities Network

o   Here is an endorsement of OFN from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall  and another from Incredible Edible Todmorden

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[tom okane]

Thanks Nick, I'll let Jack get back to you if he's keen as he's going to lead on setting up OFN with us. Cheers, Tom

Sent from my iPhone